This invention relates to improvements in a bow assembly for supporting a tarpaulin cover on an open top truck cargo bed.
It is common practice in the trucking industry to provide flexible covers for cargo in open top truck beds, semi-trailers and the like and since such covers must be frequently put in place and removed in the loading and unloading of cargo, it is desirable that this be able to be accomplished in a simple and easy manner and preferably by one operator.
Such covers are used both with and without supporting bow structures and many prior art disclosures are directed to various means for expediting the manipulation of the cover itself. However, since the use of bows has many advantages in the securing and tensioning of these flexible covers and in increasing their utility for shedding rain water and the like, one of the important objects herein is to provide an improved bow assembly which materially increases the ease and facility for handling by one operator. Prior endeavors to improve the construction of bows for such purposes are exemplified in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,969,284, 3,384,413 and 3,785,694.
More particularly, it is an object herein to provide a bow assembly for supporting a tarpaulin cover on an open top truck cargo bed that comprises a plurality of separable parts, each of relative light weight for ease in handling, that can be quickly and easily assembled and mounted on the bed and quickly and easily removed and disassembled.
A further object is to provide a bow assembly of the above class which includes bow units telescopically slidably arranged relative to supports removably attachable to the cargo bed sideboards to not only aid in maintaining the sideboards in a vertical position but to permit them a reasonable amount of flexing as cargo is loaded or unloaded.
Another object is to provide a bow assembly as characterized which includes a headboard component mounted across the forward end of the truck bed that will direct rain water off the side of the bed and away from the cargo and, together with a complementary wind barrier will protect the cover from displacement by head winds.
Still another object herein is to provide a bow assembly of the above class in which undue strain on the sideboards is eliminated by the sliding capability of the bow units.
The foregoing objects and such further objects as may appear herein, or be hereinafter pointed out, together with the advantages of this invention will be more fully discussed and developed in the more detailed description of the accompanying drawings.